Statement
Tehran Forum on the Holocaust
December 21, 2006
The American Friends Service Committee is deeply saddened and dismayed by the forum on the Holocaust held under the auspices of the Foreign Ministry’s Institute for Political and International Studies December 10 - 12 in Tehran and personally hosted by Iran’s President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. Under the guise of science, this forum gave a platform to those who deny the Holocaust.
The fact of the Nazi genocide of some six million Jews and millions of Gypsies, Poles and other peoples caught up in the Holocaust is not an “historic issue.” The AFSC knows by its own experience working with Jewish refugees fleeing the Holocaust, taking relief supplies into some of the camps, and working with survivors after World War II, that the Holocaust, in all its horror, occurred. It is a reality that the world is still struggling to confront. We grieve that the first lesson of the Holocaust -- never again -- has yet to be learned. In the past 60 years, the world remains at times indifferent and at other times, unable to protect the victims of genocide. The dead of Rwanda, East Timor, Tibet, Bosnia and Darfur are silent testimony to this lesson unlearned.
The survivors have stories we need to hear, as indeed we need to hear the stories of the Nazi Holocaust.
Even though we find ourselves in profound disagreement with President Ahmadinejad, AFSC believes that it remains vitally important to keep open channels of dialogue and communication with the government of Iran. As the Iraq Study Group report suggested, we too believe that Iran has the potential to play an important role as a force for peace in the Middle East -- but only if it is not isolated. In that spirit AFSC will continue to reach out to the Iranian people and their leaders and pursue dialogue on the basis of what we believe to be the shared value that affirms that of God in each of us.
We are reminded of this quotation from one of the most revered Persian poets, Sa’adi:
The Children of Adam are limbs of each other
Having been created of one essence.
When the calamity of time afflicts one limb
The other limbs cannot remain at rest.
If thou hast no sympathy for the troubles of others
Thou art unworthy to be called by the name of a man.
Sa’adi (1184-1292)
Paul Lacey, Chairperson
Mary Ellen McNish, General Secretary
American Friends Service Committee
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The American Friends Service Committee is a Quaker organization that includes people of various faiths who are committed to social justice, peace and humanitarian service. Its work is based on the belief in the worth of every person and faith in the power of love to overcome violence and injustice.
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